News Clips - Retired Military Leaders Speak Out Against Torture in South Carolina and Florida

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GUEST: Lieutenant. General Harry E. Soyster

DATE: January 11, 2008

HOST: Taped Interview

HOST: General Soyster, now you are going to be going around and talking to every candidate in both parties. And, specifically what are your concerns regarding torture?

HS: Well, as you would imagine most of us have avoided politics through our career, but we travel to South Carolina and we also now have recently been to New Hampshire and to Des Moines, Iowa to talk to the candidates, therefore one of them will be our next commander in chief about torture. It is un-American and it doesn’t work, and reliance on it can lead to pretty disastrous consequences. We feel strongly that we should do anything that we can to preserve the values that the real soldiers that we have fought for and just uphold the best highest standards and humane treatment for those who are going to conduct interrogations

HOST: There seems to be a wide or broad definition of torture, ranging from water boarding which is pretty serious to shining a bright bulb in someone’s face or playing loud music. What do you really consider crossing the line in an interrogation?

HS: Well, it’s pretty clear. The standards that we would like to follow, which is now being addressed. The techniques that are provided in army field manuals covering torture and interrogation. And, of course, any form of torture is always hard to define. Any form of torture is illegal and I think it is absolutely immoral and certainly not the values of the United States. There are specifics to follow. It doesn’t mean we can’t be aggressive in interrogation and use good techniques, but we certainly don’t want the young men and women that have to do this involved with anything that resembles torture or bad treatment or inhumane treatment of the captured.

HOST: Do you think that this puts some of our troops at risk if this is going on out in the field?

HS: We don’t use aggressive …

HOST: Uh, I’m sorry. Do you think that the use of torture would put American troops in the field at risk?

HS: Uh, yes, because first of all we probably won’t get the right information, but we also want to set a standard so that uh we would expect the enemy, whoever they are, to treat our prisoners in a similar manner. So by using good techniques – avoiding torture we think that we put our troops in a much better position.

HOST: You referenced something a few minutes ago about an army manual that discusses this issue, or covers it I suppose. Are you saying that this manual is outdated and things need to be taken out, or is it not being followed and that is where we are really getting off on some of these allegations of water boarding and pre draconian methods that are being used?

HS: Well, in fact, the field manual is very current it has been recently updated completely reviewed as a result of the things that went wrong at Abu Ghraib, and other places where it was clear that the standards were not clear or they weren’t being followed. So, in fact, that manual is very, very current. And, we think that it should apply across the entire spectrum of those who conduct interrogations, including the central intelligence agency, who has asked for different standards.

HOST: So, when you sit down with candidate X, per se, what is your goal? Is your goal to find out what he or she would do about this issue if elected, or do you want to advise them?

HS: Yeah, it’s primarily, we view it as primarily as an education process or an opportunity for the candidates to sit down with a group of fifteen or sixteen retired generals and officers who are lawyers, doctors, physiatrists, intelligence officers, and combat experienced officers – to give them – to give the candidates the benefit of our experience and expertise. And also to let them know how um, important their role of commander in chief is. In other words, the commander in chief has a direct impact on soldiers, and so they all know who the commander in chief is. His picture is up in all the orderly rooms and so he has to be very careful as to what he says because the soldiers know that and so we uh, encourage them, the potential commander in chief, to ensure them that they observe the highest standards of this country in anything that they say.

HOST: So, really, this is an educational experience for them, not any kind of endorsement?

HS: Absolutely. This group is brought together by human rights first and it is very clear that this is a non partisan group, and in fact, if any of us had endorsed a candidate we were asked not to participate because we have offered this to the candidates or both parties and we wanted to be absolutely non-partisan and simply an opportunity for the candidates to address the issue with a group of very experiences retired officers.

HOST: General, I think that those are all the questions I have. Is there anything else you would like to say?

HS: I appreciate the opportunity to address this issue because we think that it is a significant national security issue and it needs to be addressed and the public needs to be educated to have the debate that it should be. Thank you very much for this opportunity.

HOST: Thank you for your time. You have a great weekend.

HS: Thank you. Bye Bye.